Once Upon a Shooting Star
by The Infamous Wootermelon
Summary: When Gabby wishes upon a shooting star for a more adventurous life, she falls into a crazed world of Redwallers, where the righteous act as judge, jury, and executioner to condemn a strange stranger on the word of a more familiar stranger. OOC, minor bise
1. Chapter 1

**_Once Upon a Shooting Star_**

_**Chapter One**_

_Disclaimer:_ I own the plot and original concepts, characters, et cetera. Everything else belongs to its respective creator(s). The lyrics at the beginning of each chapter are from Walt Disney's _Pinocchio_, from the song "When You Wish Upon A Star".

_When you wish upon a star,_

_Makes no diff'rence who you are,_

_Anything your heart desires_

_Will come to you._

When a young girl named Gabby Bourne wished upon a shooting star that her life would be a lot more exciting, she had no idea what she was getting herself into. One minute, she was sitting in study hall, trying to read the stupid book that Mrs. Mitchell wanted her to write a review on, and the next she was spinning crazily through the sky to a lush green forest below.

As Gabby regained her senses from the sudden, nauseating plummet, the girl realized two things. One was that the grassy ground was very hard and that she had been falling at a high speed; her other discovery was that she was, in fact, not in school. Gabby was usually a very astute girl, but the fall had disoriented her, confused her, and had generally addled her wits, and had taken her logical rationale along with her tolerance for pain.

"Oh, God, I'm gonna be sick," Gabby groaned, heaving up the lunch that she suspected the evil cafeteria ladies of poisoning. Rubbery chunks of meatloaf and the stringy green beans came up almost immediately, splashing the hem of a green habit.

It was a mossy green, but it wasn't the clothes so much as the feet that interested her. They were not unlike the feet that her pet gerbil, Verity, had. She followed it up, seeing more moss-green habit stretching around the bulk of a plump middle, a furry tail that was long, and a face that made her heart stop beating for three or four nanoseconds. The face was shaped like a teardrop, with two ears that were thin and circular. The nose was like a pink button sewn onto the apex of two gold cheeks with sleek, glossy fur and thick whiskers like fishing line. Dark brown eyes peered at her, stunned beyond belief.

Her heart got kicked in the bum by her brain and started beating wildly. Her legs felt like carved blocks of solid lead or gold or something heavy as she tried to piston them but failed. Her jaw slackened, leaving her mouth open in shock. The mouse stumbled away from her, its scaly pink paw reaching toward something at its hip, drawing her stunned gaze to the dagger belted onto its huge middle firmly. Gabby knew instantly that the tiny blade, no bigger than a large rose leaf and decorate like one too with gold, was razor-sharp and dangerously lethal, a household hazard in her country, and that the creature would be very willing to use it on her.

"Oh shit oh shit," she muttered, coffee-brown eyes widening. "You are a very big mouse. Been eating your vegetables? Or maybe cake?"

Then Gabby fainted.


	2. Chapter 2

1**_Once Upon a Shooting Star_**

_**Chapter Two**_

_If your heart is in your dream,_

_No request is too extreme,_

_When you wish upon a star_

_As dreamers do._

Gabby opened her eyes groggily, only to find herself in the middle of a bit of a sticky situation. She was trussed up better than a hostage would be – and she just might be one, she reminded herself sarcastically – in a very small bed with surgically clean white linens, no doubt in some sort of infirmary. The air smelled of pungent and astringent herbs, medicinal remedies, viscous concoctions, and syrups and pills that probably tasted no better than bile.

"Which I would know about, of course," Gabby muttered to herself, her ill humor appreciated by no one and nothing but her, the herbs hanging from the rafters, and the empty, eerily still room. "Echo," she said softly, in a voice that suggested her calling to someone from across a far-off distance. "Ec – aah!"

An oversized mouse had entered the room, and, being ever-so-slightly handicapped with ropes binding her, disabling just about any free movement excepting those of her neck and jaw, she tried her hardest to scoot away to the far edge of the bed. To make a long story short, the human-sized mouse gave her a very confused look as Gabby tried to scramble and heave her body back onto the bed using a sheet as a rope and capturing it between her wrists.

The mouse, clearly a female with dark brown fur and white markings, shoved her up on the bed. Then she gave Gabby a fierce look with her liquid black eyes.

"What are you called? Where do you live?"

"I'm Gabrielle Bourne, resident of Springdale, Ohio," the human girl replied smartly with a rigid back, the air of a soldier who had made the unfortunate transition from fighter to prisoner of war surrounding her. "Everyone who knows me calls me Gabby."

"I never 'eard of Springdale, O'io," the mouse commented. She cocked her head. "Bourne? S'an odd name. You got pale fur."

"Pale fur?" She was stunned, a state she was starting to get accustomed to. "I don't have any fur. I have hair. I am pale, though."

The mouse agreed, nodding sagely. It was extremely true; Gabby's skin was almost dead white, and her hair was whitish blonde. As she looked at her hands, she hit upon an idea.

"Could I, er, be loosened up? The ropes sort of hurt, if you catch my drift," the girl mumbled lamely, shrugging her shoulders before wincing.

"You don't 'ave any fur," the mouse noted, nodding her head.

"Yes, but I do have muscles. They hurt. I also think my hands, er, paws, are numb."

"Oh." The mouse hurried to untie her hands, but then a tall, hefty otter strode in, his dark eyes flashing. The female mouse stopped short, her inept paws pausing in their clumsy scrabble to free Gabby. "I'm sorry, Affidavit! She tricked me!"

He shrugged his tattooed shoulders, rolling them. In his strong paws was a bowl of steaming, bright orange-red soup. The bowl was made of a honey-hued wood, very shiny and polished. The hardwood gleamed.

"Soup?" Affidavit asked, his nautical accent laying so thickly on his words that it muffled her ability to understand him. She gave him a blank look. "Soup," he said again, slower. He lifted his paws up, showing her the soup.

"Oh" was the elongated reply. "Er, yes, please."

The mouse finished untying her. Gabby took the soup bowl, gave the otter a confused look, and just stared at the red liquid.

"What's the matter?" the mouse asked.

"Well, for one, I don't know your name," Gabby told the mouse.

"I'm Sister Melody," the gullible mouse replied sheepishly.

"_Sister_ Melody?" The otter and the mouse nodded. "Am I in an abbey or something?" Again, they nodded. "Oh. And I don't have a spoon."

The otter pulled a wooden spoon from a pocket in his tunic. After shaking her hands to restore the circulation, she dug in voraciously, finishing the soup in a matter of minutes.

"Do I get seconds?" she asked hopefully.

"Sorry, but no," Affidavit shrugged. He wiped her face with a damp cloth, tied her hands back up (but more loosely), and led her downstairs. A plethora of oversize woodland creatures – mice, hedgehogs, otters, squirrels, voles, a hare, and even a badger – made it seem like a nightmarish, distorted version of Disney or Winnie the Pooh.

And they were all giving her strange stares. Their beady black eyes were fixed on her. Gabby shivered; she hadn't received this much scrutiny since she had dyed her thick, whitish curls dark brown in the fifth grade. Then her brown eyes started to swim in tears. God, her girlfriend, Rae... They had been going to dye Gabby's hair a sandy color. Gabby wiped her wet cheek with her shoulder and tried to ignore the sharp, dull ache of homesickness.

"What _is_ that?" "She's as bald as a snake, not like us." "Is this the one...?"

Murmurs and whispers flew around her like gnats. They quieted as the badger stood up.

"Wangieur the Prophesying Seer," the badger started off, while Gabby thought if there was any other kind of seer, "foretold that a stranger coming to our Abbey would cause one with a pure heart to die."

"What the hell? And you think _I'm_ this stranger? I didn't come here of my own free will. I was dragged here while unconscious," Gabby broke in, catching onto the striped badger's insinuation immediately.

"Silence," the female badger barked imperiously, glaring at the human girl with indignant eyes. "What's your name?"

Stonily, Gabby said nothing.

"'Er name be Gabby Bourne, Abbess Alba," Melody supplied meekly.

"Why doesn't she reply? _Clearly_, she is not mute, nor is she nervous, as she had the audacity to rudely interrupt me," growled the martial Mother Abbess.

"You ordered me to be silent," snapped Gabby, "and _clearly_, one cannot be silent and introduce themselves at the same time." Her tone was laden with bitter mockery, a hard pill to swallow for Alba, who had been treated with nothing but respect and fear for God knew how long.

"Speak when spoken to," Alba amended sheepishly, her face bright red beneath the sleek fur.

Gabby's color was high with anger.

"She needs to die!" a mad vole demanded, eyes wild with fervor. "If she causes the death of an innocent..."

Demands for her death were screamed all around her, echoing in the Great Hall. Fear crept up Gabby's spine as thoughts raced around in her mind like mice chasing cheese on a fishing pole.

_Oh, God, Rae, I'll never see you again. Don't let them kill me, God. I'm still young and I haven't lived my life yet. Oh shit oh shit, I'm gonna die I'm gonna die, oh shit..._


	3. Chapter 3

1**_Once Upon a Shooting Star_**

_**Chapter Three**_

_Fate is kind,_

_She brings to those who love_

_The sweet fulfillment_

_Of their secret longing._

The decision had been reached. She was going to die. They would do it quickly, chop off her head with Martin's sword. Quickly and hopefully painlessly, it would be over, the pure ones safe.

Gabby had finished crying. Her eyes were red and swollen, her throat raw, and her lungs burned. She coughed again, blurry vision finding solace in the night sky that glittered black and silver-specked in the distance.

"Um, Affidavit," she croaked, her voice hoarse, "is it okay if I have some of that spicy soup you said you loved?"

Being alone for hours, they had talked. He was sympathetic to her plight and had spoken out against her killing in vain. Since he was against her death, he was no longer her guard, but he kept her company. The angry, mob-starting vole was her guard.

Affidavit nodded and went out of the infirmary to get a bowl.

She closed her eyes and wished that she would go home. She didn't care about adventure and excitement anymore. All she wanted was to go home, back to her girlfriend and her boring life and that stupid book Mrs. Mitchell wanted her to read and review.

What she didn't see was the shooting star winking reassuringly at her as it created a bright arc in the fiery sky.

Gabby waited until dawn, the time when they all agreed to kill her. Wangieur the Prophesying Seer was already awake, visiting her. He had an evil smirk on his face as he looked at the empty bowl of soup and the empty-eyed girl that had been condemned to die.

"What are you smirking at?" she snapped.

He grabbed her face forcibly and whispered into her ear, "Have you ever heard of a self-fulfilling prophecy? You're innocent."

"You are one fu –" she spat before a gag was stuffed into her mouth.

Mother Alba walked into the room. The big badger lady carried Gabby roughly down to the orchard, where Gabby had dug up a six foot patch before she had been sent to her confinement. No bloodstains to slip on and that save the labor of them digging a grave, Wangieur had cruelly explained.

The Dibbuns were asleep, knocked out by a sleeping potion so they wouldn't see the execution.

Affidavit gave her sympathetic glances, his eyes red and puffy. "Sorry," he said.

Her eyes, in reply, were filled with understanding and defiance. She was working on spitting out the gag to scream out what was happening.

The warrior wielding the sword came to her as she knelt in the grave she'd been forced to dig for herself. As the sword sped through the air, she spat out the gag. She felt the sharp pain slice through her neck as she screamed, with the very last ounce of her life, "I'm innocent! It's a self-fulfilling prophecy!"

Then she was dead.

Her last words caused a stir amongst the Redwallers. Affidavit was sobbing, Alba was looking ashamed, and the angry vole pointed to Wangieur the Prophesying Seer.

"_He_ was the stranger who would cause a pure one to die!" he roared.

Wangieur was subsequently mobbed by a riot of tiny angry shrews led by the angry vole. He was dead before he knew what hit him.

Compassionately, Affidavit buried the headless corpse of his new friend in the grave she'd dug, feeling the calluses on her hairless hands, looking at her swollen eyes as he closed them. Her white, bloody curls were in a hopelessly tangled mass.

After he had packed down the dirt with his rudder, he looked contemptuously at the mob of berserk Redwallers, the dead body of Wangieur, and the guilty-looking Abbess. "You were the ones who caused her t'die, wi' yer bloodthirsty call to pr'tect the pure ones!" he accused. "_You killed Gabby!_ She had a family, she was in love, she was barely starting her life, and _you killed her!_ Yer a disgrace to Redwall and Martin and wha' they stood fer, and I'm ashamed t'call ye Redwallers! I'll be off, but I'll be back in a few days wi' a gravestone fer Gabby, an' I'll be back once a year, for two days, on the anniversary of when she was here."

With those words, Affidavit stormed out of the Abbey, leaving behind Redwall, taking with him the ideals that Redwall had been founded on.

A few days later, true to his word, Affidavit put a marble slab on Gabby's grave. It read:

GABRIELLE BOURNE

OF SPRINGDALE, OHIO

KILLED BY REDWALLERS

IN THE AUTUMN

OF THE SHOOTING STAR


	4. Chapter 4

1**_Once Upon a Shooting Star_**

_**Epilogue**_

_Like a bolt out of the blue,_

_Fate steps in and sees you through,_

_When you wish upon a star_

_Your dream comes true._

Gabby woke up in the hospital, Rae at her bedside. Her girlfriend was crying; her damp face was buried in Gabby's stomach. _Whoa, deja vu._

"What happened?" the blonde croaked.

Rae started, and then stared at her girlfriend with wide, disbelieving eyes. Then: "Oh, my God! You're awake!" Rae screamed. "I've missed you so goddamn much!"

"What happened?" she repeated.

"You suddenly fainted during Mrs. Mitchell's class. You were brought here in an ambulance, and you were hooked up on an IV. Then, all of a sudden, you started to choke and you were spitting up blood and holding your throat. You fucking _flat-lined_!" she sobbed. "Don't you ever do that again! Thank God you were only dead for a few minutes. You screamed something right before you died, though."

"What did I scream?" Gabby asked; though she had a haunting feeling that she already knew.

"That something was a self-fulfilling prophecy and that you were innocent," Rae told her, wiping tears off of her face. Then she gave Gabby's hand a kiss before leaning over and kissing her on the mouth. It was short, though, because Rae pulled back, new tears on her face. "They don't know why that happened, but I hope it never happens again!"

Doctors came in and shooed Rae out of the room, despite both girls' protests. A nurse told Gabby that, although she was being removed from ICU, she had to be supervised for a week, just in case there was a relapse.

Gabby didn't care though. In a Dorothy-like way, she thought it was good to be home. In fact, the only thing she missed from Redwall was – a tear trailed down her cheek – Affidavit, the only one who had protested against her killing.

_There's no place like home there's no place like home there's no place like home…_


End file.
